Use a Cheap Pair of Locking Pliers to Hold Your Hood Up!

Normal hood support rod's are $20+.  I got a 3 pack of locking pliers for $1 from Home Depot!  $19 in my pocket, I still have 2 extra locking pliers, and I don't have to fear for my head!

DIY Pac-Man Costume For Under $15!

For Halloween I wanted to be Pac-Man.  Figuring it out took a little ingenuity, but overall wasn't too bad!  

Supplies:
$0 Cardboard
$1 Roll of cheap duct tape *had this already
$1 Bag of Glue Sticks
$8 Quart of True Lemon Yellow Paint (Walmart brand)
$3 Black Paint (sample would be plenty) *had this already
$1 Black mesh *had this already
-----
$14 Total, I payed $9 because I had most of these supplies.

Tools:
Hot Glue Gun
Box Cutter
Paint Brush
Protractor
Ruler

I found an image of Pac-Man someone used for an algebra or trigonometry class.  I measured the diameter to be 2 3/8", and the length of the mouth to be 1 1/4".  

I got all my cardboard for free at Costco.  Usually there will be some slip sheets in their metal box bins, but if there isn't just ask around.

My first attempt was a 25"  circle with a 60 degree 13" equilateral triangle cut out of it.  To create the circle, you can use my tutorial from our Minnie Mouse Bean Bag Toss.  As you can see it was a little small.  OK A LOT SMALL!  Time for attempt #2. 

The next attempt I used a 36" circle with an 18" triangle.  For the triangle, draw an 18" line.  Next line up a protractor and mark a dash at 60 degrees.  Draw another 18" line from the end of the first line, through that dash.  Connect the two lines.  

Once you have your circle and triangle, place the triangle on the circle, lining up two corners to the outside of the circle.  Trace it, and cut out the lines.

For the arm hole, I took a couple different plates and saucers and matched them up with my arm until I found one that worked, traced it and cut it out.

Copy and cut for the second side.

For the connecting center, I measured from shoulder to shoulder which was 16."  I added 1" to be safe (I regret doing this because it doesn't sit directly on my shoulder), and 1" for the connecting kerf.  Cut your connecting center so the cardboard is horizontal.  This way it can roll and take shape.

Once you have your center cut, roll it up so it will take shape easier.  Next make a line 1/2" in on each side.  Take a blade and make cuts up to that line, bending inward as you go.

Begin your assembly.  I hot glued and duct taped the pieces together.  The top mouth section was the same as the rest of the center pieces, except I used stiffer cardboard (unbent), and I cut a rectangle out so I would be able to see.  The bottom I cut a piece 23"x18," and rolled 5" worth of it.

 

Once all the assembly was complete I finally got to the fun part!  PAINT!  I got a quart of Walmart's True Lemon Yellow paint and  I had some left over black chalkboard paint for the mouth.  

For the eyes, I wanted them to look like a backwards Pac Man. 

It took a couple different saucers and bowls to figure out a good size for them.  I drew a circle, measured to the center point, and drew a 60 degree triangle from it.  I wish I had done this before assembly and painting.  

Finally, I hot glued black mesh to the eyes and the front viewing rectangle.

Pac-Man in action!  

 

It was a lot of fun making it, and even more fun wearing it!  I did bump into a car at one point while trying to pick up a balloon that was running off in the wind.  The peripherals aren't great, but it's a small price to pay for a awesome costume!

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Here's a reader-made costume for her son that she posted on our Facebook page!  So flattered that it worked out great for him!

 

Kitchen Backsplash on a Budget

Tools you will need:

• Tile Saw
• Margin trowel 
• Wall trowel
• Buckets at least 2
• Towels
• Pencils or sharpies
• Tile spacers
• Sand paper (optional)
• Rubber Float

To save money, we purchased floor tiles from the clearance section of Lowes.  We got the last remaining 10 pieces of these dark 16x16 tiles for .72 a sf, and a 2 boxes of 12x12 tiles for .60 a sf.  The black marble tile was a splurge at $4.  With thin set, grout, and the cheap tiles, we ended up paying less then $50!

But we payed for it in labor.  To create all of those tiny pieces required hundreds if not thousands of cuts. 

Drawing the Accent Star
Here's a  great tutorial on drawing a 5 pointed nautical star.  For mine, I used a piece of paper starting with a center point (argh for not taking pictures!) and sketched 2 10" perpendicular lines centered at 5", then 2 5" perpendicular lines diagonally centered at 2.5".

You could also size and print an image from Google and use that.  Once I had my paper drawn, I cut out one of the triangles and used that as my template.  After cutting out all of the triangles, I had this:

I attached masking tape where I would cut the black marble because I couldn't see any markings on it otherwise.  To do the cutting, I cut it into 4 pieces first, then trimmed out the star section.  The marble was very brittle because of the veins, so be very careful and slow.  One tiny section broke off but with a little super glue and the star and grout pushing up against it, you wouldn't even know it was there!

Excuse the dirty crockpot in the picture

Here's the final product ready for some thin set!!!

HOORAY!

I measured out where I would need the star to go before taking the stove out.  Use a level to make sure it's perfect.

You can apply tile directly to drywall, but you should rough up the paint with some sand paper to get better cohesion.  Because the star was so heavy, and the marble was so slick, I had to screw some boards up to make certain it stayed put.

Here's a great tiling tutorial.   

I cut each piece to be 5 7/8" x 1 7/8."  The best way to do this is to make templates, and cut each piece exactly the same way to create cohesion.

Using the 12x12 tile, cut a strip that is 12x1 7/8."  This will be a cutting template to create more strips.  Use this template strip butted up against the edge to cut another strip.  Cut this one in half and it should be about 5 7/8."  This will be your final template.  Mark each template with sharpie, and don't lose them!   

When marking the tiles, make sure they are dry or the marking will bleed.  Find what marking techniques work best for you and the material.  I've used heavy pencil lines on certain materials, and sharpies on others.  If you use sharpie, rub it off right after you put it through the wet saw.  I hate the "tile pencils."   I find they don't give a good enough edge, and peeling the paper/sharpening them is awful.

Here's the 90% completed stove side.

If you look closely at the top of the tiles you'll see numbers.  I would number tiles and spaces that needed distinct cuts, so I could take out several without confusing what goes where.

I was working 2 jobs at the time so I only had a few hours a day to work on this project.  It took a long time!

Here I'm applying thinset to a trowel, and then putting it on the wall.  I found this to be too messy and imprecise because of the minimal working room.  It also didn't give you enough time to get everything perfect.  Eventually, I would just apply thinset to each individual which seemed to be easier.

Use spacers in every direction and make sure your lines are straight.  Check them with a straight edge of some kind often.  Also, consider how you want your outlets and edges to look.  If you want them inset, draw a box around where your outlet covers are and leave 1/8" space.  Also consider if you want a grout line in the corner or if you want the tile butted up against the wall. 

Since this project I've used the harder plastic spacers which have a lot less give to them, making it easier to hold straight lines and not have to keep going back to fix slippage.

Here's the finished view from the right side, without grout.

Here's the view over the sink.  There were a ton of tiny slivers below the windowsill.  Those were the hardest pieces to cut out of the whole project because they had a tendency to break, especially tiny L's.

Here's the left side without grout, breathtaking!

Abby sure loves it!

And here's the final with grout! 

 

If you have created a custom back splash, floor, or shower, I want to see it!  Comment below and share.

If you enjoyed this post, check out some of our other diy projects:

Lego Bed Frame

The Crib Gate Scandal 

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The Crib Gate Scandal

Once Gabe started crawling he could not sit still.  This boy of ours loved to explore, but nowhere near as much as he loved to climb.  I think he started cruising and climbing before he started crawling.  Before he was an accomplished climber, tall apple boxes did the trick of keeping him out of danger.

Total cost of project: less then $10!  We got the crib for free from Craigslist.

Boxes weren't cutting it anymore

In our attempts to stop him from getting into the kitchen where there are so many dangers, we looked around for child/dog gates at all the retail stores and online.  There seemed to be none for such a large opening.  We also considered wood and the alternative pvc gates.

This is from http://awickeddiylife.com/diy-pvc-hearth-baby-gate/  

What we didn't like about the pvc gates was the look isn't quite right for us, and our son
 LOVED to chew on things, so we did not want him chipping off a bunch of chemicals into his little mouth.  After several weeks of fighting with him constantly getting into the kitchen, I came up with this idea: cribs hold babies, why couldn't a crib be turned into a gate?  Crib-gate was born!

Finished view from kitchen, notice the latch is unreachable by a child.
Though it is difficult carrying one and trying to open it.

Finished view from living room

Gabe was very helpful in construction, here I was removing all the hardware and laying out pieces.

Gabe was very helpful during deconstruction.

I began by screwing the "sides" of the crib into the walls with L brackets.  For stability, I used a cutoff from the crib side I didn't use to brace the sides against the kick plate of the cabinets.

Sides mounted, useless box blockers still in place

I measured the distance between the crib sides to make my gate width, then went to figuring out how I was going to turn the decorative back of the crib into a fancy gate.  I used a straight edge and a framing square to make sure the cuts were straight relative to the slats and bottom because the top of the crib was curved.  Then I used my miter saw after I had pulled apart all the pieces to cut the top and bottom to size.

A good view of what the gate will look like, excited at its potential! 

After I brought the top and bottom pieces back in, I realized that because I had cut off so much of the curve, the lengths no longer lined up.  I had to figure out how long the slats and sides would need to be so I assembled the gate's top and sides, and brought it over for some head scratching.  

Slats are longer then the sides boo hoo!

With the "bear's ears" at the top sections of the sides, I found that I needed to cut the sides as well so the bottom would fit.  Once that measurement was found, I could then start to work on the slats.

"Bears Ears" dilemma

I trimmed the slats down to size, and then I had to shave off a bit wood on each sides of the bottom for the tenons to fit.  I did all of this with the miter saw.  At the time I was pretty new into wood working, so if I had to do it over again I would use either my router in the router table or some chisels.  It was almost impossible to control the depth of cut, and moving the pieces under the blade with my left hand while holding the handle of the saw with my right was definitely not ideal, but it all worked out in the end and I still have all of my fingers so I'm satisfied.  

The baby gate has held up remarkably well.  It's gone through two years of Gabe standing on the bottoms of it and shaking it like crazy, the dog pawing it, and now my daughter hanging on it!  The only real damage it's received after all of this punishment is a few teeth marks.

On the few occasions where we have forgotten to lock the gate, or he's broken the kid locks off of his door knob, he's gotten into a ton of mischief

Sorry for the sideways video, anyone know how to solve this issue?

The baby gate's been a huge success, and it's a great conversation piece for guests.  It's been up for 3 years now, and still keeping the kids out of mischief!

If you have a baby gate you've created, or have any questions or comments about mine, please feel free to leave a comment.  I'd love to hear from you!